


a sign, an omen, and the vision-3.

by arrowthroughtheheart



Series: gore, angst, and my babies. [3]
Category: Day6 (Band), ITZY (Band), NCT (Band), Stray Kids (Band), TOMORROW X TOGETHER | TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Blood and Gore, But also, Gen, Gore, Heavy Angst, Hwang Hyunjin-centric, Minor Character Death, NCT 127 Ensemble-centric, OOC characters, POV Alternating, Science Fiction, Zombie Apocalypse, i alternate between a few names to call zombies bc its awkward, maybe there are plot holes bear w me, mentions of cannibalism, no beta we die like men, sometimes, though not explicitly shown yet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-15
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:54:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25279582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arrowthroughtheheart/pseuds/arrowthroughtheheart
Summary: “Go on,” he urges, standing up. The message was clearly meant for Somi, but as he says it looking into Felix’s questioning eyes, Hyunjin himself isn’t really sure anymore. “Ask them.”“N-no, Captain,” Somi stutters, still in the crouched position she has been this entire time.“Alright, you heard the boss,” Yeji stands up, pulling the rest of the sitting members with her, “they will definitely be able to handle a few cannibals.”“Canni- what?”
Relationships: Han Jisung | Han/Hwang Hyunjin/Lee Felix, Hwang Hyunjin/Everyone, Hwang Hyunjin/Hwang Yeji, Hwang Hyunjin/Kim Seungmin, Jung Yoonoh | Jaehyun/Lee Taeyong, Kim Dongyoung | Doyoung/Lee Taeyong, Kim Dongyoung | Doyoung/Nakamoto Yuta, Lee Jeno/Na Jaemin, Lee Taeyong/Everyone, Lee Taeyong/Nakamoto Yuta, Lee Taeyong/Suh Youngho | Johnny, Mark Lee & Lee Taeyong, Na Jaemin/Zhong Chen Le
Series: gore, angst, and my babies. [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1720744
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	a sign, an omen, and the vision-3.

**Author's Note:**

> this makes absolutely no fucking sense unless you read from the beginning- hehe. oh! and i've returned to watching attack on titan the same exact time i start to pick up on the gore side of this series so that's fun. this absolute clusterfuck happens in one day forgive me for spelling (and everything else) mistakes, it happens, okay :')

Hyunjin looks up at the fogged mirror, focusing on the outline of his own reflection since not only is he halfway blind from how bad his eyesight is; the mirror was met with his scalding hot bath water’s fumes before he finished bathing this early in the morning, and now the plain surface returns to its cold static state before Hyunjin walked into the cubicle. He runs his fingers through the strands of his hair that has gotten quite long since the last time he inspected his hair and had half-a-thought of chopping them off, but putting them in a little ponytail has been some kind of therapeutic escape for him these days and he quite enjoy the feeling of hair framing his face in relaxing times.

His hands reach forward to automatically dry the fogged mirror by default before a spine-tingling memory triggers his fight or flight responses and it makes him shift away, only being able to dry half of the mirror. His father used to hate it so much if their bathroom’s mirror gets fogged up, and despite every single pretentious bullshit Mr. Hwang pulled out of his ass about how taboo it is to let the mirror stay foggy, Hyunjin used to think to himself that his father is just a coward who watches too many horror movies that includes mirrors. 

That was a bad thought to dwell upon, especially since Hyunjin needs to be ultimately focused on the things they’re going to go through today.

It’s finally time, and last night-- _truth be told it was five in the evening_ \--the other academy they came to know as _D06_ requested a video conference with their teachers and the core team included, everyone else apparently not allowed to listen in but Lee Taeyong being Lee Taeyong, lets the students who are curious to hang around in the room, hidden like little mouses scattered throughout the cafeteria. They didn’t get discovered, obviously, since Dong Sicheng; their camouflage-pro teacher - helped in this little sneaky mission. There wasn’t much that the head of _D06_ talked about, the man acting a lot miles different if compared to _0127’s_ own head teacher. 

Hyunjin should’ve known Park Sungjin is in no way the same head teacher Lee Taeyong is, since Jaemin and Jeno mentioned a little bit about how scared they are of their headmaster a few months ago, but when he actually sees the man in action - although Sungjin was just sitting behind this other teacher named Kim Wonpil and their core team while they exchange their greetings, and that is usually not accounted as any type of 'action' whatsoever - Hyunjin was sure he immediately shared Jaemin and Jeno’s intimidated nature. 

The gist of that conference was about how Lee Taeyong’s students - _or soldiers by this point-_ need to try their best and make sure that death isn’t going to be an absolute result when they’re finally faced with an option to either live or die on the battlefield with a threat that won’t surrender--they mean the zombies--unless their head gets sliced off, but in the middle of Sungjin’s short speech he said something along the lines of, “If _the_ Lee Taeyong was responsible of your physical training, I wouldn’t really have any doubts, but then again - he _did_ get a little too cocky and assured our boss that he could be responsible of an entire academy before he went off grid, so,” he gave the teachers on the other end of the line a curt nod, “we’ll see how this one goes.”

That was about it, and in the early hours of the next day, Hyunjin is already calmly seated in the cafeteria. Calm is an understatement, since his heart’s palpitations are about as absurd as Doyoung’s comment that came fleeting through while the young man examines his pocket blades about how Hyunjin looks oddly ‘calm’. Hyunjin has always looked oddly calm, that’s how his _face_ is shaped. Doesn’t mean he actually is.

Their core team was requested to arrive on _D06’s_ fancy sports field at about 6AM, and even though there’s only about a half-an-hour walk to get there, apparently they’re supposed to move even earlier. 

Mister Seo made an announcement that the core team will move on foot accompanied by Mister Kim and Nakamoto, bright and early at exactly 3AM. Once they arrive at the _D06,_ Mister Kim and Nakamoto will return and once the mission is over, the core team has to go back to their own academy that same night on foot once again, now without being escorted by two of their teachers. If they didn’t make it back to their own dormitory by at the very least 11:59PM and there was no request or news coming from the _D06_ about the mission being extended, the current core team will drop in rank, or even worse - be expelled; all according to how late they are in returning home. _D06_ has confirmed that this was only a twelve-hours mission at the very maximum, so there’s little to no explanation that is going to be accepted if they were to return back late.

They didn’t ask _why_ they were encouraged to travel on foot, but Taeyong encouraged someone to ask Youngho about the rule. 

“The gas station and every other modern resources you have now won’t last forever, as we have seen - since even the strongest of soldiers could fall victim under this zombie-fying poison. You need to depend on something you can trust most,” Youngho explained, “yourself.”

Despite all that, Hyunjin is sure this is some kind of cruel leg-workout thing that they’re about to be put through, since _D06’s_ academy is - though not far, per say - located in a higher ground than theirs. The climb was cold and non-humid since it was literally three in the ass crack of the morning, but Hyunjin still finds himself almost heaving. He doesn’t though, since his mouth and nose is covered by a thin layer of mask with three little dots on each side. They open and close with an oddly robotic noise everytime Hyunjin breathes, but it has been thirty minutes and he feels no symptoms of turning into a braineater yet, so he figures that it must be working.

Which is odd.

How are the academies that now operate as military training bases able to have all of these highly-functioning gadgets in such a short amount of time? It’s not exactly the shortest amount of time, Hyunjin thinks, looking at the once fancy road leading up to _D06,_ withered plants on each side of the road a very telling fact that it’s been quite a while since people dared to even land a single foot outside. But it also hasn’t been very long. Simply put, if even Hyunjin and his current core team feel like they’re unprepared enough for their mission today, it couldn’t be that long ago since some kind of underground and maybe black-market-related factories could come up with an idea of zombie-posion-filtering masks and _gates,_ more or less proceed to mass produce these things and install them on the garage of each academy.

Hyunjin is so sure that their gates have never even been changed--or renovated, since the first time he stepped foot inside that academy two years ago. 

So is it possible that this entire situation was. . .?

Mister Nakamoto held a fist up, tension surrounding his palm as he stopped the students tailing after him. Both Hyunjin and Yeji followed the motion since it’s too dark for the people in the back to see their teacher’s hand and Somi was a split second away from shooting the question people who are suddenly stopped usually ask. Ryujin and Beomgyu were quiet, thankfully, but there’s shifting from Mister Kim, who was at the very back.

“If we don’t get to the _D06_ soon, I’m putting you all up for adoption,” Yuta mumbles, voice playful save for the fact that his stoic face is still looking straight, into the shifting figures a few feet away from them. “But we can’t go straight ahead since there are zombies having a feast a few houses away from us right now,” he continues, shooting a look over his shoulder, “but none of you are allowed to shoot zombies in any kind of situation whether it be near your death or not without the surveillance of your legal guardians, unless you have at least _one_ successful assignments.”

Hyunjin cringes at this, narrowing his eyes to look at the obstacle in front of them. He sees nothing that is particularly disturbing since he's long accepted that his eyesight is pure shit, but there’s something indeed. He can _hear_ them.

“But you and Mister Kim is allowed to murder, right Sir?” Felix chimes in from the background, his voice only a notch above a whisper. Yuta purses his lips together, looking even more bored. 

_“Literally_ where’s the fun in that,” he crosses his arms before both of his eyes light up in excitement. Literal excitement. Mister Nakamoto did a little turn, standing on his tiptoes to catch his partner’s eyes on the very back of the line.

“Doy-”

“No,” Doyoung cuts him off, slinging the weapon he was holding in a stance when the line was stopped by Yuta a little bit earlier, “absolutely fucking not.”

“I haven’t fucking _said_ anything, bitch,” Yuta grumbles, though a sneaky smile is painted on his lips. “Nakamoto, watch your language,” Doyoung retaliates, both of his arms reaching to rest on his hips while his eyes look up and down on his one-year senior with pure judgement. “You cursed first!” Yuta kicked a pebble in Doyoung's direction, which the younger skillfully avoided.

“Well, yes,” Doyoung nods with conviction, “but it sounds extra scary when a man like _you_ curses. Right kids?”

Yuta’s eyes flashed with offense for a split second before he tilted his head to the side, eyes roaming to the sky in confusion. “You know what, I actually think you’re right for once,” he shrugs, returning his gaze to the front where the zombies are still. . . ripping someone to shreds. “Alright fucking fine, we won’t run away from them after shooting one,” the older between the two teachers relented, and Felix frowns a little as he watches Doyoung walk up beside Yuta, eyes _flickering_ in joy. “Life lesson number fifty-five hundred from Mister Kim and Nakamoto, outdoor class,” Yuta announces, reaching into his back pocket before he walks backwards dramatically with wide opened arms, a few steps behind Doyoung who is bolting towards the herd of zombies. Yuta’s little smile blooms into something sadistically _wrong_ while he says: “Now with lab bunnies that were human-turned-human predators!” and his hands motioned for them to get closer to be able to take a good look as the squelching vivid noise in the background implies that Doyoung has _absolutely_ dug the tip of his sword on the side of one of the zombies’ heads. 

Hyunjin looked up within the exact same time Doyoung dismounts his deeply buried sword from the zombie’s momentarily shocked head only to be sliced off of its rotten neck by Doyoung’s left-hand, which swung the sword back in after pulling it out of the undead’s skull. Something splattered onto the ground and Doyoung kneed the headless, twitching zombie all the way to the ground before he steps on it, and the move was something oddly victorious that Hyunjin can’t get his eyes off of Doyoung’s graceful swordsmanship. The older man has never exactly thought the highschoolers anything aside from walking them through their obstacle runs since he specified mostly with the junior highschool students, but then again, Hyunjin thought he should’ve got a whiff of what all of their teachers are able to do, supposedly. There’s always something new to discover from them everyday and it’s confusing the shit out of Hyunjin.

Yuta came into Hyunjin’s peripheral view, holding the middle of what looks like nunchucks but with two sharp ends that deems it impossible to be held like regular nunchucks. It looks as sharp as Doyoung’s glinting sword, even, and Yuta’s in a stance Hyunjin has never seen his three regular teachers do. His left leg was bent so low his knee almost touched the ground, but then again he’s awfully fast and moves as sharp as ever while he moves here and there to avoid the zombie’s bites on a lower level than a human’s usual hip. This was smart, Hyunjin thinks, since if the creatures don’t have a functioning brain they can’t bend _naturally,_ so Mister Nakamoto is pretty much untouched from down there, left leg bouncing him place to place while his right leg helps him chop the zombies’ heads off when he trips them over as his double-edged nunchuck-sword-thingy finishes the zombies off. 

Hyunjin has literally _no_ idea where these two men had their sharp weaponry stashed away before they pulled them out, but they’re very insanely tactical and strong that Hyunjin lets himself a moment to think.

He’s always thought that everyone aside from their trio of highschool teachers aren’t as good or well-trained as Taeyong, Youngho and Jaehyun. Mark Lee proved him wrong from time to time since the kid is almost as young as they are and he isn’t their teachers at all but his literal hand to hand combat could result in severe injuries and literal death, but aside from that Hyunjin has never seen his teachers’ teammates in duty, either, to compare any of them to the levels he’s seen of Taeyong. 

But when you think about it again, what _has_ he seen Taeyong do aside from very obvious zombie-burning and every other move he’s shown to the class?

Hyunjin took a step back to make sure he’s not having a mental breakdown right here and now since his ideals and principles are being put in question, but by the time he looks back up, Mister Nakamoto is circling his nunchuck-sword’s chains around a zombie’s neck before he grips on the two sharp edges of his weapon to _pull_ the zombie’s head off, and he finished with absolutely no injuries despite the fact that he just gripped on something as sharp as. . . whatever that was. 

What the fuck kind of people are Lee Taeyong’s team?

Felix took this time to inspect the littered zombie bodies closer, his eyes narrowed down on one pool of rotten-looking liquid which seemed to be the blood of the undead while Nakamoto Yuta took his time to take five steps back, accusingly glaring at his partner. “Doyoung, that wasn’t as flashy as how I intended them to be,” he groans, which was retaliated by Doyoung’s little shrug. “Personally, I never even think your sentences sound flashy. Especially when the spectators it's meant for are considered kids.”

Yuta shoved Doyoung away from his side, and when Hyunjin came to an awareness of his current surroundings; the weapons both his teachers had on their hands were no longer there. Odd. The only thing he saw was two little bandaged-up sticks clinging on Mister Nakamoto's back, the same type of covers seen under Mister Kim's belt, looped inside the leather-material he's wearing on his hips.

“I still think exploding their brains from afar and letting the rest of the braineaters chase after us would truly have been a better learning experience for the kids, though,” the older man says, his voice echoing in the now silent eerie morning. “Not in some other academy’s neighbourhood, Nakamoto,” Doyoung grumbles, scratching the back of his head while cursing his friend, the words mumbled like a drunken slur under his breath followed with; “we’re teachers now. Or whatever.”

Which was understandable, at least for Hyunjin. He’s not quite sure the rest of his team heard any of Mister Kim and Nakamoto’s hushed conversations since they’re either way too focused on the scientific facts of the twitching zombies on the ground, or they’re zoned out completely with eyes focused anywhere _but_ the murder scene they’re presented with. 

Mister Kim turned around at the last second, beckoning Hyunjin and Yeji over to continue walking towards _D06,_ and the fogs cleared up if only a little bit for the students of _0127_ to see just how grand and over-the-top the academy they’re face-to-face with truly is. 

_D06_ sits almost at the top of a little hill (or mountain) that was renovated years ago by a generously influential man who stopped an ongoing project by a foreign company that would’ve allegedly hurt the environment surrounding the mountain, and as a result of respect towards the man that most people don’t know the name of, no one else has yet to harm the environment where _D06_ stands.

Hyunjin has heard stories about this man - bad stories, obviously - since his father and most of Mr. Hwang’s co-workers are inevitably at a disadvantage since the lands where _D06_ stood clearly have a high potential of being a good infestation, but then again the lands are untouched. Even when other important figures try and put their hands on said land.

This led Hyunjin and his conspiracy-theorist mind to believe that the influential man who was obviously; an earth-and-nature invested man is _still_ alive and well until now. He’s probably still sitting above everyone on a seat filled with power by now, and speaking of him would either bring bad luck or deem you worthy enough to work _for_ this man. Having a father who delved deep into the world where everyone is power-hungry and insatiable of what they already have, Hyunjin is pretty much aware of everyone’s train of thoughts. Familiar enough, even, to know that this first assignment they’re doing could be much more of a political move than he thought it was.

Which was why their own teachers were. . . troubled. What could they be troubled about, though, Hyunjin is still unaware.

“I wouldn’t go as far as telling you kids to behave, because there’s no point in telling you that,” Mister Kim says briefly, not even sparing a glance behind him while they push the button to _D06’s_ front gate, “but don’t piss them off.” Hyunjin hides a grimace that was about to make its way onto his face and live there rent free, because he’s very much sure that this ‘they’ isn’t limited to only this new academy and their visible formation of teachers. Sometimes Hyunjin hates the fact that his ears are so sensitive in spotting people’s underlying messages.

“Well, I mean,” Mister Nakamoto adds, tilting his head to the side when the gate slides open and the two man usher their students inside. The older teacher’s next words are whispered, but when Hyunjin looks over his shoulder, scandalized, and Nakamoto Yuta sends him a knowing wink, he knows damn sure something is happening around the corner.

_Unless it’s absolutely necessary._

_Don’t piss them off unless it’s absolutely necessary? What does he mean, though?  
_

Hyunjin had no time to think at the moment, since his team stopped making their way towards _D06’s_ entrance after realizing that Hyunjin is just standing all the way behind them, unmoving. No one said a word until Yeji spoke up.

“Shouldn't we be going in?”

Hyunjin nods, and soon enough their footsteps rang through the hallway that would lead to the academy’s lobby, one side of the hallway’s walls are littered with body-sized windows and are opened, letting the cold air in. There’s obviously already movement and life inside, since there are squeaking shoes and murmurs coming from the other side of the lobby’s entrance, but for some reason and another, Hyunjin felt as cold and eerie as he felt a few moments ago, outside. 

The entire academy is colored with pastel and dark purple, and when Hyunjin pushed the lobby’s door open with the side of his arm since his two hands are tucked in his pants since it’s still so cold - there are bright hanging lights that were hung from the inhumanly tall rooftops, its light reflected from the squeaky clean walls and marble tiles. On one of the tiles were the academy’s previous name and their symbol, plastered down as if they still go by the same name. It used to be called. . .

“Halt,” someone’s voice enters Hyunjin’s ear canals as his peripheral vision catches sight of a tall, looming man strutting towards them. Hyunjin stops dead on his track, which makes everyone else stop, too, in fear of running into him. The man made a disgruntled tongue-clicking noise when he saw this unfold, however, before he stopped right in front of Hyunjin, looking down at the core team’s Captain. “Did they teach you no manners down there, young man?”

This took Hyunjin almost an entire minute to understand, and the next thing he knew his body was almost folded in half due to how passionately he made himself bow. 

There are rustling noises behind him, and Hyunjin took this as a sign that his teammates are _also_ greeting this man with a bow? Maybe. He sure hopes so.

“This wasn’t what I was talking about,” the tall man taps Hyunjin by the shoulder two times, bringing the young man up without actually touching him more times than necessary. Hyunjin motioned to Yeji to get everyone to a polite standing posture while he turned his body forward to look at the older man in front of them who was pushing his index finger towards the bridge of his nose to fix his glasses. A teacher, definitely.

“I was more so referring to the fact that you didn’t immediately fall into a line when you saw and heard me approach, but,” the man clears his throat, “this will still have to make do. I’m Park Jaehyung.”

Hyunjin leaned backwards a little to _actually_ try and see how this Park Jaehyung looks like, since he looms over Hyunjin quite a bit and the bright lamps hanging from behind him don’t really help the case here. Aside from the fact that Mister Lee has referred to Park Jaehyung as ‘old’, whether it be his actual age or the fact that Mister Lee and this man over here has known each other for a long time - there’s nothing else Hyunjin really knows about this mysteriously dressed man. 

Hyunjin’s little research which predates all the way back to the first time he’s heard of Jeno and Jaemin’s academy ‘number’; D06, has resulted in a few known general facts that he didn’t know before; the first one being the fact that the teachers in this academy has never kept a secret that they’re a part of the military forces who all have experience in teaching unlike Hyunjin’s own teachers, who faked the legitimacy of their teaching licenses for the entire time that they're there. The second part of this discovery is the fact that _D06’s_ teachers aren’t from the _secret_ military defense system. Park Sungjin and his current teammates are very much official soldiers that you can even find some general knowledge about them from a simple internet search. Park Sungjin and Kang Younghyun were from the military air forces, Kim Wonpil and Yoon Dowoon were navies, and Park Jaehyung here, who are standing in front of them, was the army’s strategist ever since he got into an accident where he stood a little too close to a bomb-detonating team who failed their mission.

One of the members of the bomb-detonator team was Park Jaehyung’s significant other at the time, and she died during the explosion while he lives on with his skin, bone, and blood defects which rendered him unable to go outside while the sun is shining too bright - and that’s just one of the things he isn’t allowed to do. His body is also not allowed to feel too cold or too hot, but that was absolutely impossible when he would move from place to place during official missions he would continuously take, a few years ago. 

And then he announced that he would take a lengthy break, some news stations even announced the fact that he retired from the military program - until he became a teacher. Park Jaehyung had five whole years of being a military strategist before he resigned into being a sport-based highschool teacher in a bourgeois neighborhood, and after that, he was no longer seen outside. Some people find abandoned tunnels that are strongly locked and protected with traditional, old metal gates from time to time though, and they would usually say that it’s the road Park Jaehyung would take when he’s interested in a lengthy nighttime walk without having to go outside, above ground. But no one’s ever confirmed nor denied it, so for half a decade and even more, he turned into a myth.

“Since you’re here already,” Jaehyung speaks again, and Hyunjin finds himself snapping back into reality. He’s been zoning out a lot recently, and it hasn’t been for a good cause, most of the time. “We should just get to the briefing. As much as I trust the headmaster with his decisions, I trust how I present my ideas a lot more. If we wait until six, the sun would’ve been too bright and I wouldn’t even last long above ground without withering away until you all understand the gist of my plans.”

Park Jaehyung’s voice sounds strained and as if it couldn’t go higher above a whisper, so Hyunjin had to strain his neck to listen to the man. 

They stopped when Jaehyung stopped, giving them a look over his scarf-covered shoulder. “I commend you for arriving a lot earlier. It gives me at least some time to look at my students before I have to return. . . underground.” 

Hyunjin is unable to see the man’s eyes since they’re covered under his slightly larger beret, but Jaehyung’s voice turns even gentler as he says: “It’s been a while since I’ve seen them.”

It _is_ true, then. After Hyunjin read the countless articles about Park Jaehyung and how much he seemed to have hidden himself after the explosion, his simply pessimistic brain provided simpler and more logical answers to the questions that rose from the people around the internet. Hyunjin genuinely has thought that Park Jaehyung could might as well be dead, and his dead was kept a secret by his own teammate since it would be a shame to lose someone who has a fighting spirit as large as Jaehyung does; who still went on living even after his entire life as a normal human was stripped away from him. That, or, Jaehyung could just be alive, yes, and the underground theories would’ve been correct, yes. But he would still be on his deathbed.

None of Hyunjin’s thoughts would’ve led him here, to this moment where he sees this bomb-survivor in front of his eyes, still roaming around the hallways even though the cold air of the mornings on the top of a mountain made him have to cover himself in almost five layers of coat and scarfs. He can even talk, still, save for how he sounds like he’s about to cough every other syllable, and he’s still a strategist. 

He _planned_ this assignment, and not only does he plan this assignment; he’s planned a few other ones. It was pretty subtle evidence, but Hyunjin remembers how this isn’t _D06’s_ first assignment, and Jaehyung has said that he usually leaves the plan-presenting to Park Sungjin, but this one time he wants to do so on his own. How does one have that much energy on living and surviving that they’d be fine spending most of their lives underground, surrounded by walls only to come outside once the sun has set or before it rises only to continue living on to put together a bunch of plans for the kids he rarely even gets to see?

Sure, these plans could just be a whole level easier to put together when it gets compared with Jaehyung’s previous missions, but doesn’t it get lonely? To live like that?

“Captain,” comes Jaehyung’s voice once again, and Hyunjin looks up towards the older. When Hyunjin gets this close, he realizes how the strategist dressed himself in a way where he doesn’t need to show any skin, aside from the top half of his head where the skin is connected to the hair. There were pictures of Park Jaehyung online, before the accident. He looked young and full of life. Hyunjin doesn’t really want to imagine how he looks like now, setting aside the fact that he’s standing close enough to the man himself.

“Can you please push the door open for me?” Jaehyung asks, scratching the side of his turtleneck-covered neck with his gloved fingers. “My hands aren’t in the best condition right now since I stayed up for three nights typing,” he snorts, tilting his head, “if you don’t mind?”

“Sure, sir,” Hyunjin complies, still a little too caught up in his own buzzing mind to say anything else except for what was expected of him.

The door swung open and revealed a large, concrete field a few levels below where they’re currently standing on. There are stairs leading down there, and at the bottom of the stairs, on the same level with the entrance to the field - was a canteen, of the sort. There are benches lined up across the field’s entrance, and Hyunjin didn’t even need to squint to figure out the faces of his old friends in the dark, chattering away. Na Jaemin has one of his hands resting on his hips while his other hand is holding onto a plastic fork that he is currently swinging here and there passive aggressively, looking like he’s scolding someone who sits with their back facing Hyunjin’s direction, so he can’t really see. Lee Jeno is behind Jaemin, his face as stoic as it’s ever been, both his hands holding onto a cup noodle each while he looks around.

Jeno finds Hyunjin’s face first, and it lit up into a little curled smile. And then he sees the man covered up from head to toe beside his old friend, and he panics for a split second.

Jeno puts the noodle cups down on a short concrete wall beside a bickering Jaemin and _someone(?)_ before he nudges both boys with his elbow, giving Park Jaehyung a curt nod after he managed to put the other two into a polite position. Hyunjin watches as Jeno makes the other two bow politely upon sensing Jaehyung’s arrival, and he tries to stifle his own embarrassment in failing to be suitable Captain only a little while ago. 

Hyunjin stands beside Yeji, who is awkwardly fiddling with her fingers while looking at the floor. Everyone else who came with Hyunjin seems like they’re acting out of place except for Felix, which is understandable since he goes to other schools a lot with _his_ sports team. When Hyunjin really thinks about it, though, he remembers that he’s never even asked Felix about his team.

Park Jaehyung spoke with Jeno for a little longer before he made his way towards Sungjin and Wonpil, who have been looking at the oldest member in their team for a while now. Hyunjin might have to ask about how much Jaehyung actually comes out of hiding for the sake of his curiosity, but if his brain deemed it impolite and unnecessary later on, maybe he’d put it off. He could live with curiosity if it’s just for a while. 

“Hyunjin!” Jaemin approaches, gawking with his usual-drunken state. Hyunjin only replies with a grimace-smile, the gears in his brain moving fast in awe of how much coffee Jaemin downed in this early morning for him to be _this_ deranged, _this_ early. “I bet you didn’t even sleep, did you?” Hyunjin picks the almost dying conversation back up as he accepts Jaemin’s high-five that was stopped mid-air. 

“Of course not. Who do you think I am?” the slightly shorter boy shrugs, his attention fleeting towards Hyunjin’s team.

“Oh-” Jaemin frowns, making a noise of surprise before both he and Jeno called out to Yeji at the same time, startling the girl who wasn’t paying attention. “I didn’t know you’re such a good murderer that you’d be chosen as a core team! Congratulations,” the caffeine-drunk boy continues though his words are about as clear as jumbled up slurs. Yeji obviously needs a few seconds to translate what comes out of Jaemin’s mouth into something a little more coherent for the normal human brain, so while the girl tilts her head in confusion, Jeno clicks his tongue.

“That’s not _nice,_ Jaemin,” the other boy beside them says, preceding Jeno, who was about to say the exact same thing. This made Jaemin turn around, his lifeless hair which looked like a cotton candy a few months ago is now long enough for him to put in a half-up ponytail even though that would leave the few strings of hair on the front loose - which is exactly why Jaemin whipped his own face with his hair while turning around, offended. “Can _you_ be nice to your seniors?” Jaemin retaliates, his bottom lips jutting out.

“I can if they actually act-” the younger boy’s words were cut in the middle courtesy of Jaemin’s own quick-witted hands slapping over the kid’s mouth. “This brat, I swear to _god._ Chenle, I have a vice captain reputation I have to keep,” Jaemin sighs, rolling his eyes before turning back around to face their guests. 

“Jeno, you introduce this kid to them,” _D06’s_ vice captain mumbles, his face now contorting somewhere in between a pissed off and cranky mood, “I’m busy keeping his mouth shut.”

Hyunjin lets his eyes flicker towards Jeno’s face, who was apparently grimacing in faux pain this whole time. 

“Ah, yes, this- uh,” Jeno clears his throat, avoiding eye-contact while scratching the back of his head, “this is the youngest member of our core team, a second year student; Zhong Chenle.”

 _Oh, so_ that’s _the famous foreigner,_ Hyunjin takes his time observing the younger’s face before he gives Chenle an obligatory bow to greet him. When they were shown _D06’s_ data a few days ago, there’s a foreign name in their core team that someone in their school was familiar with since he’s apparently a child actor before he came all the way to this side of the world just because he’s interested in growing up to be a professional athlete. Zhong Chenle’s parents are very supportive over anything he does, so basically, his existence in _D06_ right now is also. . . supported. . . by his parents. He’s one of the only kids in their academy who is still on good terms with their own parents, but compared to the kids over in _0127,_ the amount of parents who give a shit are generally considered a majority.

Hyunjin doesn’t really get how some parents allow their children to fight zombies on a daily basis with _consent_ and not blackmail - like some _other_ parent he knows, obviously not his own, no - but he’s heard of some people who said ‘the richer you are, the crazier you are’, or something along those lines. Maybe the amount of money people have clog their brain cells virtually, or something. It could be it.

Speaking of virtual things. . .

“So,” Felix looks from side to side, and the _D06_ trio’s attention gravitates towards the freckled young man. “Since Zhong Chenle is here, are those cameras for him, then?”

Felix knows he’s not the only one who realizes how much cameras there are on each side of the field, with security cameras maybe included. There are also very bright tube-shaped lamps standing on the sides, placed behind the cameras, looking futuristic. The field is all in all very. . . extraordinary, and it makes Felix and his introverted-self feel a bit overwhelmed. Especially since he never liked leaving his own dorm room back at home.

“It’s not _for_ anyone per say,” Jeno explains, one of his feet nudging the minimallistic design of the field entrance’s gate open. “The cameras are stationary. You know, since the field was most frequently used to hold championships and whatnot. The lamps were just installed there a year ago since our Headmaster felt like it’s just a good thing to have good lighting in a place where most sports match happens,” the crescent-eyed boy smiles, “though I personally think he’s just self-conscious about how much better people look on TV when they’re aided with proper lighting.”

_Was that. . . supposed to be a joke?_

Felix chuckles awkwardly, scratching the back of his head before another question floats into his awareness like a puppy on a cloud. “Uh. . . but like. . . they’re not going to be used today, right?”

“Which one?” Jaemin takes turn to respond to Felix’s questions, and the latter points at the line of cameras with his right index finger. “Oh! Yes they will! Isn’t it exciting?” the vice captain nods, a grin making its way onto his face, “I haven’t been on national TV for a while now since our last assignment was a little too grim for national channels to air since Mister Captain over here blew up an entire block a few seconds after I managed to get out. As you know, I’m usually used as bait for the little zombies. Since I’m loud, and bright, and. . . annoying. But we usually don’t have guests that aren’t considered rivals. _And_ we’re not going to show up on the sports channel, where we usually appear on. This whole experience is new for us, too, you know?”

“When you talk like that you sound like you’re purposely aggravating their inner passion for rivalry. It’s downright repulsing,” Chenle chimes in, sounding like he’d rather be anywhere else in this world. Jaemin looks offended, again. “I didn’t mean anything by it, though!” the older retaliates before going in to choke Chenle, disturbingly realistic in practice.

“What these two were trying to say is,” Jeno cuts in, shoving his two bickering friends to the side, “it’s not that big of a deal. They’ll just cover the most recent thing the ‘youth’ has been doing these days and go on and on with a pretentious voice in the background and our national anthem talking about how much responsibility we put on the youth these days and get the rest of the people fired up about killing any zombie they see on the streets. Anyone who’s alive enough to watch the broadcast, anyways. Filming us as a part of the broadcast is basically just a required indoctrination to help us wipe out the zombies a lot faster since the people would get fired up to help. . . maybe.”

Jeno sounds unsure at the very end of his sentence, but before Felix can bring up the ‘maybe’, Hyunjin said something along the lines of what Felix has been thinking about, too.

“There’s a lot of ‘they’ in this conversation, so who are this. . . ‘they’?” 

Jeno shrugs once again, facing away from the cameras and their teachers, looking down at the ground while he speaks.

“The people responsible for this entire fiasco? I don’t know. Me and my other classmate overheard Mister Yoon talk about how the higher-ups have now taken control over the media stations, but you know. . .” Jeno fixes his lowering glasses, “everytime we ask, their answers are as cryptic as they could be. And I’m not exactly the one who has the biggest brain to spare. Not to mention how busy I’ve been trying to keep up.”

“Do people even still find it entertaining to watch the television these days?” someone asks from behind Felix, but he couldn’t muster the energy to turn around. It wasn’t as if the freckled boy came into this mission with his own agenda of figuring things out, if only little by little, but apparently doing that proved to be a lot harder than he thought it would’ve been. Not only is _D06_ as confused as they are about the regulations and assignments; they are also exposed to the world. For doing something as noble as what, killing ex-humans?

“I don’t know, dude,” Jaemin stopped trying to piss Chenle off to answer the question that was hanging in the air, “people find entertainment in _any_ kind of life-threatening battles.”

 _D06’s_ vice captain shrugs his shoulders, offering them a bitter smile.

“As expected from human kinds, you know?”

.

Sure.

Hyunjin could bear with the thought of sick and twisted people who have never left the confines of their own home - _he would’ve said ‘comfort’ but there’s barely any comfort in hiding from zombies despite what kind of house you own, so_ \- but the real bombshell dropped on his head when they lined up and the cameras started recording. As if the blinking lights didn’t trigger his nauseous childhood memories enough; something he supposes he should’ve faced before he got here - one of the cameramen shoving the entire camera all over him and the core team’s faces was a whole other thing.

From the corner of his eyes, he can see Shin Ryujin shifting uncomfortably when her personal bubble was rudely interrupted, and Hyunjin wonders briefly if his teammate has ever faced something as terrifying as paparazzis --at least when they were alive and well. The paparazzis, he meant. Wouldn’t they be easy targets for roaming zombies? They’re used to curiously roaming the streets and taking shameless pictures out of nowhere, so. . .

“The location,” Yeji trails off after her right elbow nudge Hyunjin’s side, inviting the taller boy’s attention back to Park Jaehyung, who is presenting his plan in front of the row of students. “Ah,” Hyunjin acknowledged, his eyes flickering back and forth between the plan’s blueprint and avoiding Yeji’s intense glare. There’s always something so undeniably awkward that dawns upon their previous strained relationship every time anything that involves Hyunjin and Yeji’s childhood comes into play; and for this particular event, that thing is the location where their core team is headed into. 

There wasn’t much that Hyunjin could provide about this particular location except that there was a kindergarten there once, almost five years ago. 

It wasn’t his kindergarten. Neither was it Yeji’s, and supposedly it shouldn’t have been such a big stepping stone into their friendship as it is - but that was a whole other story they shouldn’t think about right now. Since this moment, this exact second they are experiencing, should only go forward. Going back into the past is never good, whether be in science fiction movies, theories, _or_ experiments. Despite however much answer humanity could ever solve if they could go back to the past, that choice should never exist. 

And so Hyunjin chooses to brush it off.

As he always does.

He brushes it off completely when Yeji doesn't show up to their infamous middle school reunion even though they promised to go together --before the fight. He brushes off the fact that his once best friend comes back into his life without ever explaining how and why she moved away without telling him a few insignificant years ago, since he’s never felt like it was his right to pry the answers out of her. He brushes off the fact that the same best friend showed up on his doorstep once while her hands were bruised and stained with blood, with her crying little sister, and let them in. Without questions. 

Today is no different. It won’t ever be different, since change will only bring pain.

“Let’s make up some kind of functioning plan, then,” Hyunjin huffs, running a hand through his hair. Coincidentally, while he says this, both Lee Jeno and Hwang Yeji moved towards him, both trying to catch his attention with different ideals in mind. Hyunjin doesn’t know if he’s glad since Jeno is able to call out to him before Yeji can open her mouth, or if he’s unlucky since he supposed he could’ve listened to what Yeji has to say, but for the time being?

“Here, Hyunjin.”

He’s glad that he doesn’t have to relive the same pain over and over again while pretending like he’s okay.

“Mister Park --uh, Jaehyung, Mister Park Jaehyung had compiled a list of the things you have to achieve. They’re all in this little file. There’s quite a lot to read but I promise it’s not hard to digest. . . for you, at least. The job assignments are on your hands, but uh,” Jeno scratches his nape, shifting to lean on his dominant leg awkwardly, “I wouldn’t have to tell you to _not_ pull out a grenade out of sheer panic, right?”

Hyunjin gave Jeno a teasing lopsided smile. “Of course, Captain. I won’t steal your special move. _You_ made it a hit after all,” he shoos Jeno away with a gentle shove.

_Now, time for the brain gears to work._

“Yeji,” Hyunjin addresses, “are you up for brain-workout or do I have to do all the thinking?”

Yeji kneed him twice after mumbling about how cocky Hyunjin has become, and with renewed excitement, the Hwangs approach their predetermined teammates.

The sun was halfway at its peak when Hyunjin and his team found themselves crouching on the corner of a housing complex’ park. There’s one apartment that is completely overridden with braineaters on their left with at least three families stuck inside, the last few reports of these families shows that one out of the three had their two sons missing --and assumed as dead, according to Jaehyung’s reports-- after they went out three days ago to grocery shop. 

Jeon Somi, who held the communication device with every other scouting group, passed the information to Hyunjin that Jeno’s team found the bodies of these sons. 

“What do you mean they ‘found’ the ‘bodies’?” Hyunjin grimaces, ducking back down to kneel on the floor. He was halfway into giving his team orders to move when Somi spoke out, seemingly unbothered by the weird choice of words that she received. “I think they mean the sons are dead?” she answers as if it’s obvious. Which, it is. But not in the way Hyunjin was expecting it to be.

“Hyunjin, why are we stalling?” Yeji asks, growing restless.

“Hold- hold on, are any of you hearing what I’m hearing?” Hyunjin points out, his index finger stopping in front of Somi’s face. “Are you sure you’re relaying the exact same words Jeno’s informant is giving you?” he asks, and Somi nods, slightly offended that her captain is in such disbelief. 

“What’s so weird about finding them dead, again?” the foreign-looking girl asks, tilting her head so she can gauge in if the apartment they’re supposed to help people evacuate from has any type of movements surrounding them. “Because they _can’t_ die,” Felix supplies, looking at Hyunjin for approval, “right?”

Somi looks as if she’s stupefied and horrified in the same exact time, her facial expressions twisting as if she’s just recently realized that something is wrong as she reaches for her communication tools. When she’s able to wear the ear-piece after fiddling it for a few seconds out of nerve, she talks into the microphone, voice a few notches above a whisper as her paled lips mutter out a few words. Hyunjin and Yeji are arguing about something in the corner and Felix is leaning a little too close to Somi’s ear-piece in hopes of getting to listen in. 

Ryujin looks at Beomgyu, who has been awfully quiet this entire morning. She decided that she won’t disturb his thinking process and keeps to herself, too.

“But they said,” Somi looks back at Hyunjin, whipping the side of Felix’s face with her hair, “they said there were also bite marks.”

“They’re also rotten, and. . . and dried out. But in weird places. Only in places where there appeared to be a lot of. . . meat.”

“Do you see what I mean?” Hyunjin throws the question back at Yeji, who rolls her eyes with her right hand on her forehead, looking more and more conflicted. “T-they,” Somi looks back and forth between her team and her noisy ear-piece she plucked out recently, “they’re asking if you know what this means. Their vice captain has been trying to get in contact with their respondents but their connections are awfully off-”

Felix is the one with the ear-piece now, looking up at Hyunjin through shaky pupils. “Jin, they sound awfully distressed, I don’t-” 

“Can they not think about it by themselves? Both Jeno and Jaemin are there, I know they’re not _stupid._ We have an emergency right here, too, Lix, if we don’t help the families in there who - if I remember correctly - haven’t had food for at least three whole days, would we not fail our literal first assignment?” Hyunjin responds, but some coincidentally right timing of the next few scenes that are about to unravel in front of him brought goosebumps onto his skin.

A loud, pained scream came from inside the apartment across from them, close and loud enough that it startled Somi who was looking straight into its entrance. Felix stood up, the ear-piece forcefully pulled out of his right ear as he looked around, alarmed, before he said, “Captain! Lee Jeno’s team is in trouble! Zhong Chenle is _hurt!”_

Time seems to stop for Hyunjin while the rest of his teammates look at him, expectant, scared, and shaking.

_Fuck._

None of this is making any type of sense, the screaming is getting louder and louder, and their communication device is making some type of muffled, weird noise. His instincts told him to both run into the apartment and help but also run all the way to where his friend’s team are located, aid them. Wasn’t that what they’re here for? To aid _D06?_

“Are they asking for help?” came his own voice, and it almost startled Hyunjin because he didn’t feel like talking. “What-” Felix looks at him pointedly, almost accusingly, and Jeon Somi flinches one more time when Hyunjin repeats, “Ask them, Somi. Ask them if they’re asking for _our_ help and if we should abandon what we’re doing here.”

The younger girl’s hand shakes while she picks up the ear-piece and the microphone, and Hyunjin had half-a-heart to feel bad. No. He’d feel bad about this later. Later. Later. 

If there is a later.

“Go on,” he urges, standing up. The message was clearly meant for Somi, but as he says it looking into Felix’s questioning eyes, Hyunjin himself isn’t really sure anymore. “Ask them.”

His voice has never sounded this strict. Strained, even, maybe, and commanding. Hyunjin has only scolded anyone twice in his life, and one of those situations got him slapped across the face for speaking to the wrong person in the wrong way. 

“N-no, Captain,” Somi stutters, still in the crouched position she has been this entire time, “we receive direct orders from Park Sungjin to never leave our designated post unless he himself asks for us to help his core team.”

“. . .that’s what Lee Donghyuck said. Aside from them wishing us good luck.”

Yeji raises her eyebrows, looking up at Hyunjin, who is still having a staring match with Felix. “Does that mean they’re cutting their communications with us?” she asks, patting the sides of her pants where her entire necessities are located, unclear if she does it simply to familiarize herself before battle or because she's slightly nervous. “Alright, you heard the boss,” Yeji stands up, pulling the rest of the sitting members with her, “they will definitely be able to handle a few _cannibals.”_

“Canni- _what?”_

“The corpses that Lee’s team found don’t turn into more zombies,” Felix explains briefly, turning around to answer Beomgyu’s flabbergasted question, “and the only parts of theirs that were eaten was the meaty parts of human bodies. So we think that there are cannibals around. _People_ who eat humans, instead of zombies. Though I doubt that any particular characteristic would mean death by cannibals are easily distinctified compared to zombies, since the poison which turns humans into zombies needs at least an entire day to process, and even longer if the victim isn’t already dead. But the victims that were found have rotten scars already, which meant they died pretty long ago.”

“But only up to three days at max,” Ryujin steps in, looking at the apartment. “Is that really enough time for a scar to rot?”

“Not entirely,” Hyunjin shrugs, motioning for his team to follow him while they head towards the apartment, “depends on how _rotten_ Lee’s team meant. But I wouldn’t question their deductions, at least.”

“They have someone from the medical department in their core team. _D06_ might’ve been a school that is famous because of their sports-based curriculums, but there are other courses of school. Huang Renjun is the medical course’s general champion for three straight years now,” Hyunjin shoves the rolled-up file he had on his hand into his front vest’s pocket. “So why haven’t they deduced that there could be cannibals, then? Why did they need to know what we think of the situation?” ask Ryujin. 

Hyunjin stops them right in front of the sliding doors towards the lobby, his own blood freezing in his veins when he sees the view inside the apartment’s long abandoned first floor.

“Sometimes,” he whispers, “when you’re scared. . .”

There’s a dead man’s eye staring straight into theirs, head turned upside down in an uncomfortable way while his entire paled body is nailed in four different points across the receptionist’s table, a few feet in front of them. He’s absolutely dead, no growling, no trashing here and there, and a very much opened stomach. His gut is everywhere on the table he’s nailed into, and the man died with his eyes wide opened, droplets of blood dripping onto the floor from his eye-sockets, tainting his forehead. His entire body’s skin was opened like a dried bear decoration, and he’s hanging on the table by the nails and his exposed spine.

There are a lot more beside him, and the stench of absolute hell and death greeted Hyunjin’s team when the door automatically opened. The small, insignificant movement multiplied the amount of fear and eeriness, and Hyunjin was about to be intimidated and crawl on his knees away when he remembered the fact that he hadn't finished his statement.

“When you’re scared. . .” he starts again, stepping one of his shaking feet into the drenched in blood lobby. “. . .you seek for other people’s approval.”  
The last few words escaped him while his eyes gaped to take in more death, more blood, and more pieces of cut out flesh littering here and there. There are visible and sure footsteps coming from a few floors above them, and the only thing Hyunjin can think about without going insane is the tight grip he has on the sword Mister Lee bestowed upon him a few days ago, thinking that working with knives aren’t going to do the core team any good. Shin Ryujin has always had swords with her, apparently, and soon enough the entire team mastered a few movements on their own. It doesn’t help, though, that zombies never sound like. . . that.

Like their footsteps are hurried, and calculated. Like they’re running away.

A sliver of fear slips in between Hyunjin’s emptied thoughts and he all of a sudden feels ashamed. Shame boosts his confidence and bravery, usually, but there’s this uncontrolled need to throw up as something akin to disgust coils up in his stomach. 

There’s a piece of broken mirror at the end of the receptionist’s desk, propped up just enough so that Hyunjin can see his teammates' various states of horror. Weirdly enough, they stood behind him just the same. No one’s trying to leave, or run, or turn around and throw up. And then he caught his own eyes in the broken mirror, looking startled and confused. Younger than he’s ever looked.

And he knows it’s not the time to do so.

So he swallowed the fear back up. Hardened his posture and his intent. Thinking far beyond tomorrow and no longer in the past. Changed. He told himself that change is always painful. He’s still right. Change was pain inflicted upon him and his friends that had the bad end of the straw to end up here with him. But Hyunjin hates it. There’s no truth bigger than the one he’s shouldering right now, and that is the fact that change is indeed painful, yes, but what good will it do anyone if they let themselves be the only ones who are pained?  
The pain will stop when they pass it somewhere else. 

The pain will only stop once they inflict the same amount of pain someplace else.

Yes, yes it definitely will.

“We’re moving in,” Hyunjin states, and the sound of an emergency door slamming to a shut flares something inside him. “Prepare for the worse.”

Running away was never an option.

And so they abandon their previous plans. Their meticulously processed plans made by Lee Taeyong, drawn out and printed by Seo Youngho, and explained over and over again in the course of the past few weeks by their teachers. There’s no use of fooling things when they’re alive and well with a brain that might outsmart their own. 

This resulted in chaos, obviously.

But while they fight hand in hand with death looming upon their doorsteps, their own academy is trying to not burn into ashes.

That same morning, Taeyong woke up with a never ending stomach ache. He’s had a few conversations with his own digestive system, scolding it for being ‘too attached with the kids’ and that they should be fine and they’d come back in one piece at the end of the day while being in denial that he’s actually pretty worried for them and that his initial reactions are always right. If he feels bad in the morning, something’s bound to go awry. 

That’s why he decided to not see his core team off this early morning, opting to look out while they leave from his occupied office’s window instead. They look relaxed, some of them - and sleepy, and that was good. At least. . . well, better than being so tense that they’d get tired before the day even started. 

Defensive Team; the ones who stayed just in case zombies sneak in during the wait until Doyoung and Yuta return from escorting the core team - are aided with three leaders, since their class scores are more or less the exact same. Han Jisung, who topped the other two with point one score since he has somewhat of a more steady aim, with both Kim Seungmin and Choi Jisoo --called Lia most of the time-- with a neck to neck level of aspiration and level-headedness that Han Jisung lacks just because he’s. . . Han Jisung. 

These three don’t have any kind of life-threatening job, Taeyong thinks to himself, even though he got a little agitated since he considers these kids in particular as his literal children - but they do have a big responsibility in going around the school every half an hour. He told them that they should be separated and take one other member of the Defensive Team with them while they go around, and only when there’s an alarm of emergency do they need to check on it together. That is, until right about now, obviously.

Lia comes into the canteen with a disturbed look on her face, her long hair tied into a panicked-ponytail with baby hairs sticking out everywhere and cuts littering the surface of her hands. This invited both Seungmin and Jisung to abandon their seat right away, running towards their partner. Right behind her, Doyoung struts in while Yuta outspeed those two, marching towards the teachers who are serving lunch, Taeyong included. 

“Oh, Jaehyun,” Taeyong refers to his co-worker, trying to ignore the curiosity coiling in his throat when he sees Lia’s flabbergasted posture as she sits, eyes still trained on Yuta’s back. “Yuta and Doyoung have arrived. Turn the gates back on-”

“I turned it on right after _this_ happened,” Yuta cuts in, pulling out an empty table as close as he could towards where the teachers are standing only to slam a decapitated head on it. Its fresh blood spills everywhere on the table, and Jaehyun regurgitates, fixing his chef mask further up his nose, kneeing the bloodied table away from his opened food. “Nakamoto Yuta! I’m _cooking-”_

“Yuta, I thought we agreed on no killing when Taeyong is around-” Youngho approaches the decapitated head, pulling out a black plastic bag from his pocket, walking towards Yuta like a man on a mission.

“This thing almost killed one of our patrolling students, Lee Taeyong,” Yuta stretched a hand out, stopping Youngho from hiding the head away from Taeyong’s view. This sentence seems to actually catch Taeyong’s interest, and his usual rounded eyes are now darkened. It almost looks like his eyes are sunken in, devoid of life. _Not yet._

“But _why?”_ Taeyong replies, seemingly surprising his co-workers with his ability to still speak. “We’ve done what they want us to do, and now we’re in the same vulnerable position as old Jaehyung and his team. _Why-”_ he emphasizes by jamming his index finger on the decapitated head’s eyeballs, “-are they still coming after us? What more do they want from this stupid _rules_ they keep pulling out of their asses?”

Doyoung stood up to usher some of the students away, though the damage is done and they’re currently seeing how angered and non-filtered their legal guardians are being.

“We can’t keep doing what they _want_ us to do, Yong. Their logics are most definitely flawed and twisted with this- this fucking- ranking systems. They’d choose the best ones who would manage to come out of this entire shitfest alive and take them in to rebrand their brains like they did to _us,_ all of that to pluck more bodies to sacrifice to these beasts that are their own mistakes while they let us die like moths! Why would you let that _happen?!”_ Yuta slams his fist onto the table at the same time Doyoung is trying his best to shoo Lia out of the canteen despite how curious and scared the young girl is.

“I am not going to let it happen, Yuta - that’s the whole reason why I let the kids take into consideration if they want to do this assignment or not. I want them alive, and I won’t let them be taken into hostage just to be molded into brainwashed soldiers like we did,” Taeyong leans back on his chair, looking right into Yuta’s eyes, “but if we don’t get to play our cards right, this entire town will be but a hole on the ground, Nakamoto.”

Yuta flinches backwards, coming in contact with Youngho’s shoulders. 

“We do not want a repetition of your hometown, Yuta,” the tallest one says, though this is much more of a whisper if compared to how stiff and anger-driven Taeyong and Yuta’s conversations had been. 

Yuta’s entire body is shaking, with rage, with something else, who knows. He’s still looking at Taeyong, who is looking back at him without any kind of underlying means. Then maybe it’s the memory that caused Yuta to fall on his knees, his bloodied hands coming up to mess with his face. It’s everywhere now, the blood, and there’s no distinctive evidence that Nakamoto Yuta _isn’t_ crying.

“But they’ve begun to release the cannibals,” Jaehyun speaks, muffled from underneath his white mask while he nudges the decapitated head to look at its distinctive features more clearly. Its teeth are sharpened, like sharks, and the middle of their tongues are split open like snakes - obviously modified by the sadistic master they serve. The sadistic master they _all_ serve. “Does the big boss still believe that letting some people’s body parts get eaten and to spread fear among teens as an effective method of discipline?”

Taeyong lets his eyes flicker towards Doyoung, who gave up on trying to usher Lia, Seungmin, and Jisung away and is now standing beside their shell-shocked figures. 

“Sadly,” Taeyong clenches his fist, making a move to stand, “I think so.”

“Taeyong-” Yuta croaks out, stopping his friend --his leader-- from leaving. Taeyong stops, taking his time to look at his only students in the room before he looks back at Yuta, who looks. . .empty. “I know you’ve got something to prove to that clusterfuck of a man we used to call boss,” the man says, still on his knees, “but please don’t. . . sacrifice anything for the sake of it.”

Lia can’t help how her eyes widen at this statement. 

“Not yourself,” Yuta continues, stabilizing himself on his feet with the help of the table, “not your life, not your sanity, and most definitely not your own safety.”

It was silent for a while, and the tension in the room is palpable enough to pop if anyone breathed any louder. 

“Yuta’s right, we can’t let him figure out you’re here. After our 15 years of effort, it’s not safe enough to let it go to waste,” Taeil chimes in, still eating the remnants of his chicken this whole time. Taeyong looks at his informant, offended as if he was betrayed. “Not you too, Taeil,” Taeyong groans, his hands twitching in annoyance, “you all _do_ realize that their teammates are out there, all six of them!”

The headmaster points at the direction where the Defensive Team’s leaders are standing, perplexed and scared. 

“All of them _and_ Sungjin’s kids are out there, facing something they’ve never prepared for, all alone, without the right type of weaponry designed to kill actual, blood-crazed and shittily intelligent cannibals that even _we_ were unable to break free entirely from when we were their age,” Taeyong continues, looking back at Yuta. “That’s exactly what you _don’t_ want, Yuta. A repetition. A sacrifice. If we don’t do something right fucking now, there’s no changing the future. No breaking free from our past.”

“Technically we didn’t say anything about _not_ helping them, old man,” a voice comes in from the corner of the canteen, and Mark Lee stood from his sleeping position, discarding the cap he had covering his face the whole time. Mark yawns, looking at his. . . relative(?) with a bored look on his face. “He just said that no sacrifices are allowed. It’s a sacrifice indeed if we go out there bold and confident with our faces as naked as the days where we used to serve the boss since they’d automatically point out the fact that we are indeed, alive this whole time,” he tilts his head, almost condescendingly, “but if we fight armoured from head to toe under the pseudonym of the Defensive Team, however. . .”

Mark trails off without a hint of continuing. He knows what he says makes sense, and he knows that his plan is the one they’re going to go with at the end of the day.

But Taeyong, usually, despises wearing uniforms. 

It reminds him of things he doesn’t want to be reminded of, days in the past where he. . . where almost all of them are doused in pain from one morning to the other. 

His displeasure shows on his face, absolutely, since Mark tsk-ed in his direction, running his fingers through the decapitated head’s hair strands to dangle it in front of Lee Taeyong’s face. The older’s entire posture froze up because of this, and Mark sent him a lopsided smile.

“Come on, headmaster. Your mental stability isn’t the most important thing right now,” the younger Lee chuckles, almost darkly, “we need you to kill for your students, Taeyong. Or have you become too weak to stand as a soldier once again, hm?”

Jaehyun cringes at Mark’s direction, obviously sensing the blood-lust oozing out of their leader upon Mark’s words. Mark is _literally_ ruthless when it comes to Taeyong. And the sole reason for that is, well. . . you’ll see.

“Fucking-” Taeyong curses, turning away from the decapitated head, and Mark. “Fine. Get fucking ready, then, you little shit. And if you don’t at least take out three dozen of them,” the older Lee looks at the younger, who is giving him a shitty excuse of a smile, “you’re going straight back to the boss’ headquarters.”

“Be my fucking guest, whiny bitch,” Mark tosses the head over his shoulder, and Youngho rushes to catch it with his black plastic bag. It’s reusable, don’t worry. 

“I’ve never been scared of that old fart,” Lee Taeyong’s youngest teammate shrugs as he goes back to his previous sleeping position, waving silently at the rest of his older relative’s friends. “Your welcome~” Mark sing-sunged, giggling, “you have him all worked up and angry now. We might not even need anyone else to help.”

“Jesus Christ, Mark Lee. We didn’t need him _that_ mad,” Youngho mumbles, tying the bag up into a knot.

Mark spared him a knowing look, thinking back to the split second where he saw Taeyong pat Lia’s head comfortingly like a mother bear despite how much anger he was oozing earlier. “Don’t worry,” Mark leans onto the wall, concluding to not share that moment he saw with anyone else. Consider it blackmail material.

“He’s not as mad as he is protective, that old man.”

**Author's Note:**

> may the plot thiccens~


End file.
